Budweiser Racing Team Notes of Interest
• Kevin Harvick and the No. 4 Budweiser Chevrolet SS team overcame a part failure near the midpoint of Sunday’s race to score a seventh-place finish in the STP 500.
• Harvick started the race from the 18th position and worked his way up to the 10th position before the competition caution at lap 40. He noted the No. 4 Budweiser Chevrolet was “starting to get a little tight in the center” of the corner, so the team changed tires, added fuel and made adjustments when he came to pit road.
• On the following run Harvick got stuck in the outside line and slipped back to the 16th position. Crew chief Rodney Childers called for track bar adjustments on the team’s next two trips to pit road to help improve the car’s handling.
• Harvick raced his way into the top five before the caution flag waved at lap 219. When he brought the No. 4 Budweiser Chevrolet down pit road for service, the chain that keeps the rear-end housing from drooping when the car is jacked up broke, making it difficult for the team to jack the car up enough to get the tire off of the ground to change it.
• The team pitted under the next two caution periods in an effort to fix the problem. Their attempts were unsuccessful and the broken chain hindered all of the team’s subsequent trips to pit road.
• Harvick took the green flag in the 25th position at lap 257. He worked his way up to 11th before the caution flag waved again. The team lost six spots on pit road and Harvick restarted in the 17th position at lap 322.
• The Bakersfield, Calif., native raced his way up to fourth at lap 385 and was running sixth when the team hit pit road again under caution 25 laps later. He restarted ninth when the field went back to green at lap 417 and was running fifth when the caution flag waved for the final time at lap 459.
• The team changed tires and added fuel during the caution period. Harvick restarted in the ninth position when the green flag waved at lap 465 and was able to pick up a couple of spots in the final laps to score a seventh-place finish.
• Harvick’s Stewart-Haas Racing teammate Kurt Busch scored the win in Sunday’s race. Jimmie Johnson, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Joey Logano and Marcos Ambrose rounded out the top-five positions.
• Earnhardt Jr. took over the lead in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver point standings following the sixth race of the season. Matt Kenseth, Carl Edwards, Jeff Gordon and Johnson complete the top-five spots. Harvick is currently ranked 25th in the standings. He’s nine points out of the top 20 and 92 back from the Earnhardt Jr.
The following is the finishing position of the other Stewart-Haas Racing teams in Sunday's race:
• Kurt Busch and the No. 41 Haas Automation Chevrolet team finished first.
• Tony Stewart and the No. 14 Code 3 Associates/Mobil 1 Chevrolet team finished 17th.
• Danica Patrick and the No. 10 GoDaddy/Get Found Chevrolet team finished 32nd.
Coming Up:
NASCAR Sprint Cup Series teams travel to Texas Motor Speedway next week for the Duck Commander 500. On Friday, FOX Sports 1 will provide live coverage of Friday’s practice session at 6 p.m. EDT. On Saturday, FOX Sports 1 will air coverage of practice at 10:30 a.m. EDT and FOX Sports 2 will provide coverage of qualifying at 3 p.m. EDT. FOX will carry the live race broadcast on Sunday at 3 p.m. EDT. PRN radio affiliates and Sirius XM NASCAR Radio will air radio coverage of the race.